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Coronavirus “Information Heroes” – Journalism That

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Coronavirus “Information Heroes” – Journalism That CORONAVIRUS “INFORMATION HEROES” – JOURNALISM THAT SAVES LIVES Andjouza ABOUHEIR COMOROS Mahmood AL-JAZEERI BAHRAIN Mystery of zero coronavirus cases ex- plained Solitary confinement for contradicting the government The Indian Ocean archipelago of Como- In the Bahraini prison where he has been ros seemed to have been spared when detained arbitrarily for the past five years the coronavirus epidemic began sprea- and is serving the 15-year sentence he ding in Africa in early April. Then a report received in 2015, journalist Mahmood by Andjouza Abouheir, a journalist with Al-Jazeeri recorded a statement in April La Gazette des Comores, explained why: denying the health minister’s claims to the samples taken from the first suspec- have taken measures to prevent prison ted cases were never sent for analysis. In inmates from being infected by Covid-19. response to the ensuing outcry, the au- In reprisal for his statement, which was thorities tried to identify her source and circulated by the Bahrain Institute for threatened to prosecute journalists who Rights and Democracy (BIRD), the au- published information “without going thorities placed him in solitary confine- through official channels.” ment and suspended his weekly phone calls with his family. Salim AKASH JORDAN / BANGLADESH Chris BUCKLEY CHINA Jailed for covering migrant workers The tough job of foreign correspondent Salim Akash, a Bangladeshi journalist in China based in Amman, investigated the fate of Bangladeshi migrant workers in Jor- Chris Buckley, a Beijing-based reporter dan who were no longer able to work be- for the New York Times who spent 76 days cause of the lockdown and had been left in Wuhan at the height of the outbreak, to their fate by the Jordanian authorities. was forced to leave China on 8 May after After a TV station back in Bangladesh the authorities refused to renew his visa. broadcast a news item based on his re- An Australian based in China for the past porting in early April, three plainclothes 24 years, Buckley had been subjected Jordanian policemen arrested him at his to personal attacks in the Chinese state home on 14 April. After initially being media about his reporting from Wuhan, taken to the immigration department, which included coverage of censorship Akash was transferred to Al-Salt prison, and public anger. where he was simply told he had “broken an important law.” BUENOS DIAS GUINEA CAIXIN EQUATORIAL GUINEA CHINA Broadcast suspended Chinese media outlet that defies cen- sorship This is one of Equatorial Guinea’s most popular TV programmes and one of An English and Chinese-language media the few spaces where a degree of free outlet based in Beijing that has a reputa- speech is tolerated. However, “Buenos tion for audacity, Caixin has defied haras- días Guinea” was suspended on 1 May sment and censorship by the authorities after it criticized the beatings that people in order to publish reports questioning in the street received from soldiers en- their handling of the coronavirus crisis. forcing the coronavirus lockdown. The It even sent four reporters to Wuhan who programme’s seven journalists were or- covered the 77-day lockdown, moving dered to stay at home until further notice. around the city when they could in head- to-toe protective gear. Photo: A «Buenos días Guinea» broadcast on Asonga TV in Sep- tember 2018. Equatorial Guinea. CHEN Qiushi Eugene DUBE CHINA ESWATINI Lawyer turned citizen-journalist Forced to flee abroad A lawyer from the far northeast province After Covid-19 reached Eswatini (the of Heilongjiang, Chen Qiushi made a former Swaziland), the authorities war- name for himself in the Chinese blogos- ned journalists that criticism of King phere by shooting videos of last year’s Mswati would be treated as “high trea- pro-democracy demonstrations in Hong son,” which is punishable by death. When Kong. After catching a train to Wuhan on Swati Newsweek website editor Eugene 23 January, he went around the city’s hos- Dube nonetheless published an article pitals interviewing the families of victims criticizing the kingdom’s handling of the and covering the chaos in videos that that health crisis, the authorities raided his were viewed by hundreds of thousands home and subjected him to such a len- of people online. On 7 February, his pa- gthy, heavy-handed interrogation that he rents were told that he had been placed fled to neighbouring South Africa. “in quarantine.” They have received no news of him since then. FANG Fang GABINETE DE CRISE CHINA BRAZIL Media crisis unit in Rio’s favelas Chronicler of daily life in Wuhan Three alternative media outlets – Papo The well-known Chinese writer Fang Reto, Voz das Comunidades and Mul- Fang is a Wuhan resident who, throughout heres em Ação – joined forces to create a the city’s lockdown, kept a diary on her “Gabinete de Crise” (crisis unit) in Com- Weibo social media account providing plexo do Alemão, a Rio de Janeiro district insights into the censorship and the hos- comprising several favelas. The aim is to pital system’s collapse. The 65-year-old facilitate informing favela residents about author’s diary entries have been turned the spread of the virus and the preven- into a book that was published in English tive measures they should adopt, and to on 15 May under the title of “Wuhan Dia- inform the rest of the country about the ry: Dispatches from a Quarantined City.” A pandemic’s impact on the favelas, which French-language version was published for the most part have been abandoned on 4 June and it is due to be published in by the authorities. There have been si- German on 9 September. Because of the milar initiatives in other major Brazilian diary, she has been harassed by trolls on cities. the government’s payroll. Ana LALIĆ Ahmed KABIR KISHORE SERBIA BANGLADESH Imposing her truth Cartooning in the coronavirus era Ana Lalic, a reporter for the Serbian news website Nova.rs, was arrested on 1 April, The famous cartoonist Ahmed Kabir Ki- the same day that a law took effect ma- shore was keeping a cartoon journal on king the authorities the sole legal source Facebook about politics in Bangladesh of information about the coronavirus in during the coronavirus crisis. Entitled Serbia. She was arrested late in the eve- “Life in the Time of Corona,” the journal ning and was held overnight for a story alluded, inter alia, to corruption. For this that reported complaints by medical per- he was arrested of 5 May and is facing sonnel about the lack of personal pro- a possible life sentence under Bangla- tective equipment. The authorities ended desh’s Kafkaesque Digital Security Act up recognizing the accuracy of her sto- on a charge of “spreading rumours and ry and dropped all charges against her. misinformation on Facebook about the They also repealed the law. However, coronavirus situation.” Lalić continues to be the target of a hate campaign and threats on social media. LI Wenliang CHINA PAJHWOK AFGHAN NEWS AFGHANISTAN Doctor and whistleblower Locked down in the newsroom It was Wenliang Li, a 34-year-old eye doctor at Wuhan Central Hospital, who In order to be able to keep reporting at first sounded the alarm about a possible the height of the Covid-19 outbreak, part coronavirus epidemic in Wuhan in a pri- of the staff of Afghanistan’s biggest inde- vate WeChat discussion group on 30 De- pendent news agency, Pajhwok Afghan cember 2019. Within days, he and seven News, spent nearly a month under other doctors were being questioned lockdown at the agency’s headquarters. for “spreading false rumours.” His death Founder and director Danish Karokhel from the coronavirus in the early hours stayed there with 15 of his employees of 7 February triggered an outcry in Chi- in order to keep the news service going na and the hashtag “We want freedom of and, despite a shortage of funds resul- expression” was used in 2 million posts ting from the effects of the pandemic, he before being censored. managed to provide personal protective equipment to all reporters going into the field. GUAYAQUIL’S LOCAL MEDIA RADIO CORONA INTERNATIONALE ECUADOR ALGERIA/USA Frontline reporters A pirate radio created by the virus In Guayaquil, Ecuador’s economic capital, the authorities were completely unpre- The coronavirus gave him back “the ra- pared for the speed with which Covid-19 dio virus.” Radio and TV broadcaster Ab- swept through the city, to the point that dallah Benadouda, who was forced to they were unable to collect the bodies of leave Algeria in 2014 after a broadcast many of the victims. Despite their own that annoyed senior government offi- lack of preparation, including a lack of cials, launched Radio Corona Internatio- personal protective equipment, the city’s nale (RCI) in late March from the United journalists kept working and continued States, where he now lives. The humour to report in locations with a high infec- and irreverence of its reporters and com- tion rate. And they paid a high price. By mentators provide an antidote to the the end of April, 13 of them had died of persecution and censorship to which the virus and another 25 had been dia- the independent media are subjected in gnosed as infected, according to a tally Algeria. The “end of the world radio,” as by the press freedom group Fundame- it dubs itself, is broadcast on Facebook dios. and SoundCloud and now has thousands of listeners Darvinson ROJAS ROYA TV VENEZUELA JORDAN Detained over a tweet Indesirable street interviews In a report from the heart of a low-income Venezuelan freelance journalist Dar- neighbourhood in Amman in April, Roya vinson Rojas was arrested at his home TV asked residents what they thought of on 21 March and was held for 12 days the government-ordered lockdown that just for questioning the reliability of the was preventing employees in most sec- government’s coronavirus figures in a tors of the economy from working.
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